The Philadelphia 76ers Art of Tanking

Do not try to lose to the 76ers. No matter how hard you try you will never win. Over the past two seasons the Sixers have mastered the art of tanking, and this year they took it to a whole new level and man are the good at it. The Philadelphia 76ers finished the 2014-2015 season with eighteen wins and sixty-four losses. To put that into perspective, only one other Sixer team has had a worse record, which belongs to the 1972-1973 Sixers who finished with just nine wins. To begin, “tanking” is the art of professional sports teams who decide to stop giving their full effort, in the hopes of increasing their positioning in a subsequent draft. The Philadelphia 76ers take tanking genesis and if your team needs to tank it should follow what the Sixers are doing.
Let’s start off with the man calling all the shots, General Manager Sam Hinkie. He has basically traded away anyone that has promise on the Sixers roster. Some might say if you show even the slightest sign of being good on the NBA level, Sam will trade you. Trading everyone good on your team is definitely a good start, but the Sixers have some more tricks up their sleeves. How about letting a player coach the team? Well in the final game of the regular season the fans got the opportunity to see Joel Embiid draw up a couple of plays for the team. Not only did the Sixers end up losing that game, but they did it in style with the help from Coach Embiid. Another great way to tank shown by the 76ers is to draft players that are injured. Seems like a silly thing to do right? Sam Hinkie drafted not only one, but two injured players in the past two drafts: Nerlens Noel and Joel Embiid. Although these young players have a tremendous future they both had to sit out for the entire season, which means more losses for the Sixers.
Let’s face it, the Sixers will not be good for a long time. The 76ers are so good at losing that they came one loss away tying the record for the worst start in the NBA. The Sixers started out 0-17 and only the Nets have started the season worse, with an 0-18 record. Losing is just in Philadelphia’s blood and I’m not sure the fans can stand this much longer. The 76ers have gone the extra mile, trading away everyone that shows promise on their team, drafting poor players, and have even let a player coach once in a while. Tanking is an art and only certain teams can perfect this, and after what has happened in Philadelphia over the last two seasons I can officially say that the 76ers have mastered the art of tanking.